China resumes pork imports from Spanish regions unaffected by swine flu
As Spain mobilizes to contain an African swine fever outbreak near Barcelona, China has confirmed a deal to allow pork imports from unaffected regions of the country to resume after all shipments were halted on Friday.
Spain is the European Union's top pork producer and is responsible for about a quarter of the bloc's output, with annual exports of roughly 3.5 billion euros ($4.05 billion), reported Reuters. China takes 42 percent of Spain's pork exported outside the EU.
On Friday, two wild boar found dead in Collserola Natural Park on the outskirts of the northeastern city of Barcelona tested positive for the disease, which were Spain's first cases since 1994.
Spain's government notified the EU and the World Organization for Animal Health about the outbreak and activated emergency measures in the affected zone.
Authorities set a 6-kilometer exclusion zone around Bellaterra, on the far side of Barcelona's Collserola mountain range, and on Monday, more than 100 troops joined about 300 regional police and rural wardens in the park to help contain the outbreak.
Authorities say additional suspected cases have been detected in the area as surveillance and containment have intensified, with drones used to locate and remove potentially infected animals.
As a caution, Madrid immediately paused shipments to China on Friday pending confirmation of the agreed regionalization protocol between the two nations, with Beijing on Monday confirming restrictions would apply only to affected areas.
The United Kingdom and Mexico are among other countries that have imposed temporary blocks on Spanish pork imports since Friday.
Spain's Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Luis Planas told reporters on Monday that of 400 export certificates for pork products to 104 countries, a third are now blocked.
"We are working to open them as quickly as possible. Our task is to keep international markets open," he said. "Our objective is to limit the zone and avoid contagion to other regions."
Catalonia is Spain's leading pig producing region and is home to about a quarter of the national herd and more than 40 percent of the country's slaughtered animals.
African swine fever does not infect humans but spreads quickly among pigs and wild boar, posing a major economic threat to Spain, one of the world's top pork exporters. Officials believe a wild boar may have contracted the virus from contaminated food, possibly a sandwich brought in from abroad.
"The most likely option ... is that cold cuts, a sandwich, contaminated food, could end up in a bin ... and then that a wild boar would have eaten it and become infected," Oscar Ordeig, Catalonia's agriculture minister, told local radio on Monday.
The cases were detected near the AP 7 highway, a key route between Spain and France. Regional authorities said the other suspected cases are under investigation.
jonathan@mail.chinadailyuk.com
